52 Mich. 480 | Mich. | 1884
Plaintiff sued defendant for commissions on a sale of logs, the sum claimed being 25 cents a thousand on between 11 and 12 million feet. The court below, allowing recovery for some other causes of action,0ruled that there could be no recovery for this, which must have been on the ground that there was no testimony to support it.
Defendant, who lives at Poughkeepsie, New York, owned the logs in question, some cut and some not then-cut, on Rifle river. January 7, 1881, defendant wrote a letter to
Defendant went to New York and was unable to contract with Hall on the original terms proposed, owing to plaintiff’s advices to Hall. A bargain was finally made for a portion of the lumber, excluding certain qualities, and the contract provided for delivery at Tawas and Bay City, and involving some stipulations as to rafting and sawing. The testimony indicates that the price received was practically
It appears, however, from plaintiff’s own showing, that he peformed services for Mr. Hall in connection with this business, and that, so far as he exercised any influence at all, it was not in the direction of getting a sale on the terms proposed. It might be a matter for serious consideration whether this double agency could be allowed to form a basis of compensation, if it were true, as plaintiff claims, that his duty assumed was merely to bring parties together. But there is nothing in the case which, in our opinion, indicates that he was to receive any compensation unless he procured a purchaser at defendant’s prices. Such is plainly, we think, the meaning of defendant’s letter to plaintiff. The only other communication bearing on the subject was a dispatch to defendant’s agent fixing the same prices, and naming Mr. Hall as the purchaser to be approached. If this is the one read in the presence of Hall and plaintiff, as plaintiff alleges, it was confined to the procurement, or at least the attempt to procure, a sale to Hall at the boom for the prices named, and the purchaser was nominated by defendant himself. No such services, either by attempts or successful results, were shown. The case, in our opinion, is entirely destitute of any testimony of the rendering of such services as were contemplated.
"W e think the judgment is correct and should be affirmed.